Malifaux from the Ground, up!

Something missing from my current terrain collection are trees and areas of rough ground.

Mali uses Dense Terrain and Woods usually fall under this category. Rough ground or boggy swamps might count as Severe terrain.

I wanted something that could fill the role of woody or rough ground. I also have some trees that need work to make them a bit more generic.

I decided to go the way of a large base with removable trees, using the aforementioned trees.

For the bases I used a piece of a plastic/ foam card. It had been a piece of matketing from work. One of the benefits of working for an Electrical Retailer is a ready supply of resources.

I carved the pieces in random shapes. I did end up with a couple of straight edges, but I can put these up against board edges or buildings.

After cutting out the shapes, the edges were bevelled with the knife.

Using a Ready-Made Filler I build up the ground texture.

Blob it on around the base, leaving hollows where the trees will sit, then smooth it out with a wet finger.

A test base above: sealed with a PVA/ sand/ grey paint mix, but  no filler. It was after this that I decided to add the filler.

The trees are easy to find at the back end of the year. The minute there’s a sniff of Christmas.

I originally intended them for Frostgrave, but I want to make them more generic.

Before and after below.

I hit them with a brush of a green, then a light brush of Yellow Ochre. The white plastic bases had two coats of the Burnt Umber.