Project - 40k/30k Trench Board

Yet another (but not the last!) terrain project I have on the go. Brother Handro and I have a narrative campaign on the go called "The Battle for Grandia" . It is the invasion of the Grandia system and more specifically Grandia Viridis  by the forces of the IIIrd legion. Loyalty and allegiances are complex, and there may even be a rift in the IIIrd legion forces...but more of that to follow...

Grandia Viridis is an agri world, and most of our games are played across fields and farm machinery, but I wanted to make some game boards to represent the more 'dug in' areas of the campaign - region spanning dug in fronts where the imperial militia/Grandia defence forces could wage longer wars of attrition, cities defended by trench works, the usual.

The boards are all 2"x2" and each have a road on one edge. This can be a central highway, smaller access roads and can be arranged in a variety of ways quite easily. It's all mounted on regular (and cheap!) polystyrene, with trenches cut into the board. The trenches are deep, marines heads stand proud but most guard/human scale models are well hidden so trench steps will be a feature in due course.

Metal trench walls, sandbags and mud is the main theme and, if I say so myself, it works quite well!! 

The fields are made from a large coir doormat, but here in lies the problem - there are some big areas of mud in between full fields but no debris/detritus!

Now clearly the trench boards need finishing, there needs to be some scatter flock to represent some of the greener expected. I'm even likely to cover the road in grit and re-paint it to add an asphalt texture

My dilemma is this...should I shred some coir mat/natural fibre plant liner and make crushed broken crops in all of the flat muddy areas?

It would let me put in tracks of vehicles to show that it was all fields and not just bizarre planting methods.

It would allow me to bury some plastic humans/drums/barrels/czech hedgehogs and wire as casualties/detritus of war.

What do you guys think? 

How are you finding the blog?

Comments welcomed!! 

 

Der H 

Thought of the day: " How can a man understand and appreciate the time of peace when he has never been in the trenches of life."