World Building: Part 9 - The Path of the Martyr (terrain progress)

It seems I've been reasonably busy on the quiet working away at the terrain for the Path of the Martyr. What has been a bit of a hot summer in "Croydon, yo", particularly in the furnace-like area of the house I'd got set aside for a painting area made for a bit of a nightmare climate. Paint seemed to dry on the brush even while using thinned paint on a wet palette.

In order to solve the problem, or avoid it, more to the point, I bought a pack of cheapo paint brushes from a discount book store by the name of 'The Works' for 3 English quids. I moved my painting shit to the dining table and did some rough and ready paint jobs with some jumbo brushes on the terrain, which seems to have turned out pretty well, even if a little basic.

It also seems I have enough terrain ready (or near enough ready) to pretty much fill a 4x4 table. Which was a surprise discovery earlier this evening when I decided to put it all on the gaming table...

The wood in the foreground is unfinished

An overview. Please ignore the miscellaneous crap in the background

Please ignore the frankly awful duvet cover that is protecting the dining table

28mm dudes eye view

World Building part 8: Background to the Path of Martyrs

Historically, during the long drawn-out and tragic period known as ‘Old Night’, the populations of the majority of the worlds inhabited by mankind in the Abstruse Sector slipped back to the worship of the Old Gods in varying guises, and were brought to compliance with the Imperial Truth only with great difficulty during the Great Crusade (M31).  Soon enough, when Horus Lupercal and many of his brother Primarchs rose up against their father, many worlds in the Abstruse Sector also rose up in support of Horus, and threw off the yoke of Imperial oppression.

For thousands of years thereafter, the Abstruse Sector became synonymous with words such as strife, unrest, and upheaval. Many were the campaigns which sought to bring this troubled region of the galaxy back to the Emperor’s light.  The ‘Path of the Martyr’ is a string of shrine worlds and moons linking the rim-ward fringes of the Seriphos Sector to the core-ward fringes of the neighbouring Abstruse Sector.  The ‘Path’ is so named as it marks the route of successful campaign of reconquest undertaken by Imperial forces led in part by Saint Felicitè, during M37.

A series of shrine worlds were erected in ensuing centuries, marking out key sites of victories, designed to act as lasting monuments to the sacrifice of millions of Imperial lives. At the end of the ‘Path’, lies the world of Felicity, which marks the site of the eventual doom and ultimate sacrifice of  Saint Felicitè, where she was stricken down as she concluded rites of banishment which ended a Daemonic incursion, and paved the way for a decisive victory against the more corporeal forces of the Archenemy.  Following this victory, the hold of chaos over the Sector waned, and was seemingly expunged. All rejoiced.

Relative peace followed until mid M39, when the entire border region between the Seriphos and Abstruse sectors was embroiled in one of the most severe warp storms in Imperial history (although due to the vagaries of misplaced data and the bureaucratic processes within the Administratum, this cannot be verified). Cut off completely from the divine light of the Astronomicon, unreachable by astropath, warp travel or even travel in real space for centuries, the Abstruse Sector had become a watchword for misfortune, nay, a curse, an augur of misery. It was a region of the galaxy that was largely ignored, although the angry stain of the warp storm dominated the skyline of many worlds at that fringe of the Seriphos Sector. A stain that was said to echo that of the very Eye of Terror itself.

In recent times, as inexplicably as it arose, the warp storm has suddenly receded.  The Path of the Martyr is once again accessible to travel, and exploratory missions of the Holy Ordos of the Inquisition have begun, with the purpose of recovering relics and attempting to ascertain the possible causes of the Warp Storm.  Eventual repopulation of the area is a secondary concern. Surrounding space is heavily interdicted by elements of the Imperial Navy which call the Seriphos Sector home.

Reports from the Holy Ordos indicate that exploratory forces of the Archenemy and the greenskin have been encountered on the Path, though the Throne knows what sinister purposes and motivations have brought them to the region…

World Building part 5 - Adeptus Mechanicus Shrine to the Omnisiah (W.I.P)

The next terrain piece I've been working on is a Adeptus Mechanicus Shrine to the Omnisiah.   This is basically the pieces from the GW Manufactorum kit that you get in the Imperial Sector box set.

The idea behind this was that having an actual manufactorum didn't seem to fit with the Shrine World plan, so I had to think outside the box somewhat. What kind of Adeptus Mechanicus type structure could I realistically justify on a Shrine World? It would obviously need to be a shrine of some kind.

From the Mechanicus perspective the space would need to be used in the most efficient way possible, so it seemed obvious to me that the structure would be multi-purpose. In this  particular case, I've tried to conjure up the sense of a pumping station that provides water from an underground source (obviously consecrated) for general purposes, irrigation of gardens, holy water etc. (this is what I envisage in my head). I'm planning on adding a small fountain or something to one of the other buildings.

The outflow pipe flows into a small pool. I'm thinking this could perhaps be the type of shit lepers bathe in at Lourdes or something. Or more likely where chemicals and mineral particulates are filtered out in the form of slurry.

World Building part 4 - ruined chapel work in progress

I recently bought a laser-cut MDF church from Ebay to form part of the terrain for my Shrine World themed board.  It's a fairly sizeable kit, measuring approx 40cm x 25cm for the church itself, but you also get a fair amount of scatter terrain, formed of fences and rows of tombstones, which cover a similar area.

Obviously, as plain MDF the church looks quite, well, plain.  So I've started making some minor modifications to it. Thus far this has consisted of using the alternative gun barrel ends from the Chaos Predator kit and re-purposing them as gargoyles and carvings etc.  This should help break up the flat surface, and in theory make it look a bit more "40K-esque".

World building part 3

Moving on from what I was saying yesterday about Cadia and the laws of decipherability and such like, I think that I would like to try an represent this, and other memorial themes on the table top.

Here are some pics I cribbed off Google...  The snowy one next to the bottom looks incredibly sad.

World building part 2

Moving on from yesterday's post, I thought I'd talk briefly about the theme I've got in mind.

The theme that I want my table to have is that of an Imperial Shrine World, in a contested part of the Galaxy. Most areas should be battle damaged, and some should be largely unscathed.

These Shrine Worlds we hear about in the background material are something that I've found somewhat intriguing since I first came across them. Whole worlds dedicated to the Adeptus Ministorum and the Imperial cult. It's a mind blowing concept to me.

I've also recently re-read Dan Abnett's Eisenhorn stories, and there was one particular element in the second book that stuck a chord with me, and that I thought would be interesting to include in my perceived theme.  This was the mention of the "law of legibility" in the cemeteries on Cadia. For those that are not familiar with this, Cadia is something of a fortress world that breeds warrior stock for the Imperial Guard's Cadian regiments. It produces a lot of soldiers. Who then die in droves, and earn the right to a burial plot on their home world.  Unfortunately, space is at something of a premium in these cemeteries, and thus there are members of the Ecclesiarchy whose specific role is to maintain these burial sites, and keep track of whether the inscriptions on the grave markers have been rendered illegible by the elements. Once a marker's inscription is considered to illegible, the dead soldier is considered to have passed from memory, and the remains will then be disinterred, and moved to a mass grave or incinerated, thus making room for fresh (or not so fresh) inhabitants of the burial plot.

Anyway, I found some images on Google Images that I thought might give me some ideas on how things might look. Only when I make the buildings for my table, they'll be crapper.

D.I.Y gaming table phase 1 - a.k.a the beast is back

Admittedly, I've been fairly quiet of late, what with Xmas and New Year and all that tripe. That's not to say I didn't enjoy myself, because I did. Anyway, I've made the tentative first steps in sorting out a gaming table for use at home.

The important thing here, apart from enabling more fun to take place, was to have something that was easy to store, and that would also look good. So I've decided I want to try and do something along the lines of a Shrine World. Although we'll see how that pans out!

Things I have used / acquired:
1.Three sheets of 9mm thick MDF, in 2ft by 4ft size.
2. Another sheet of 6mm thick MDF, in 2ft by 4ft size, chopped into 1ft square pieces - (All the MDF is readily available from B&Q, and they will cut stuff to size for you for free)
3. Can of blackboard paint (can I say this? is it PC? it's what is says on the tin, so I'll go with it)
4. Can of grey primer paint
5. Folding clips (4 of)

Ignore the shit triffid looking thing in the background

Square and beige

Tins and clips

So, by way of explanation, the 3 big sheets of MDF make a modular surface. If I use 2 of the sheets, I get a 4 x 4ft surface, which is ideal for smaller games or for Kill Team etc. If I use 3, it's a standard 6 x 4ft surface.  The boards will be held together with the folding clips, and will lay on top of an old sheet on the dining table. The boards will also easily fit in the cupboard under the stairs, with all the spiders and shit.

I undercoated the big boards with the blackboard paint, which I got because the can reckons it's really hard-wearing. Guess we'll find out in due course.... I then gave it a rough over-spray with the grey primer. It was windy outside, so it blew the spray and produced a nice effect for added interest. Well, better than flat grey at least.

The smaller boards will be used for mounting buildings etc. on. The 6mm thickness adds in a kerb height that seems sort of realistic at 28mm scale too, so I can have "roads" between the tiles if needed.

The next step will obviously be putting some terrain together. I'm quietly determined that this won't turn into another one of those projects that doesn't come to full fruition.