Age of Strife

Been a long time, really need to figure out what to do with this site. Been printing lots of 3d models but not been posting here, way too many photos to go through. But onto the topic ... I finally bought a Realm of Battle game board! When this first came out I was tempted, but thought it was way too expensive compared to buying GW kits. A couple of months ago I thought I'd look for one so that my friends and I have more than just a pair of MDF boards with a GW static grass mat (which I think I cut up for my son's model railway years ago), and I was shocked at the prices on eBay - £300 to £400 for a set, and often with no bag

Had a quick look on FB marketplace, and just an hour earlier that same day a board had been listed in a small village for collection only 30 miles away, at £70. It was painted grey with purple rocks and bright green cracks and skulls, but it was complete and otherwise in great condition including all of the clips and the bag. I contacted the seller and arranged to pick it up the next morning, drove up through the countryside and got it home safely. Yes it was a bit ugly, but nothing that a bit of paint and flock couldn't fix.



A few days later, looking in the B&Q paint aisle I realised that brown appears to be out of fashion - wasn't everything chocolate brown and tope only a few years ago? Picked up tester pots of very light grey, medium grey, and dark grey, and then popped over to Hobbycraft and was shocked that tubes of acrylic Raw Umber and Yellow Ochre were not very expensive, and compared to the tester pots that were about 1/4 full of paint for £3 I was amazed at how much paint a £5 tube provided, way more than I'd need for all of the boards.

I watched a few Youtube videos on how to paint and flock a board, and figured I'd start with one board to see how it looked. Most of the board was painted brown (the raw umber) and then drybrushed with yellow (ochre), the rocks were painted in a very light grey and some watered down ochre, medium grey, and dark grey used to add random marks, with the intention that then drybrusing and washing the rocks this would even out and look like natural rock. It didn't quite work out, looking a little like white granite with flecks, so I repainted the rocks in the medium grey, then added brown, yellow, and dark grey patches, washed with nuln oil, and drybrushed with the light grey - I was much happier with this, so then prepped another board to match.



I also use some quick dry filler on the skull pits (too many skulls!!!) and painted those brown as well, with grey rocks. My plan was to make those into pools of stagnant water ...

So I've got a couple of board painted, and the paint was dry. Up to now it's easy to change anything, just a quick repaint. Flocking was pretty daunting at this point, as it's going to be messy to fix if it goes wrong, and other than putting some flock on a figure base back in the 90s I wasn't really sure what to do. But those Youtube videos helped a lot, and I bought 5L of No Nonsense PVA from B&Q (they didn't have anything smaller that wasn't more expensive!), some All Game Terrain base layer flock packs from Hobbycraft - again, cheaper than ordering it from Amazon or other online stores - and then watched some more videos to get motivated.

The flock packs were three different colours - 2x 319cm3 of G6420 Base Layer Ground (a dried out grass colour I was going to use on the edge of the rocks), 2x 319cm3 of G6421 Base Layer Green (a medium green for the main areas of the boards), and a darker green to use to add some variation (159cm3 of G6436 Grass Spring). But I decided that the mid green was too green, so I mixed about 3/4 of the Ground and Green packs 50/50 but left enough of each colour to use to add patches, and to edge the rocks in the Ground base layer.

I watered down the PVA about 2 parts water to 1 part PVA and painted it onto about 1/6 of the first board. Using my fingers I sprinkled some Ground on the edges of the cracks, added a few patches randomly on the glue, and a little patch of Green. I then used the 50/50 mix and made sure the edges were covered as well as the rest of the glued area, leaving a little bare glue at the edges to avoid a line between each section as I'd overlap the next area of glue, and trying not to put down too much flock as I wanted it pretty sparse - enough to cover the paint mostly, but not look too thick. Then glued another section of board, and repeated, trying to not get too much glue into the cracks, and keep it off the rocks. Near the upper rock areas I put some of the darker green in little patches near the small rock piles.



The variation in the green looks a lot less stark in real life, the photos in the harsh LED lighting in the garage make it look worse than it actually was. Overall I was pretty happy with, and so I did the other board I'd prepared, and a 3rd board, and then left them a couple of days for the glue to dry fully. The excess flock on the rocks was brushed off, and in some of the cracks, as there was no glue it came off cleanly. The next stage I was less confident about - spraying them with very watered down PVA so soak the flock and get it to bond together into a durable playing surface so that it wouldn't rub off. I shook off most of the excess flock, put some more down on a few areas that looked a bit too patchy, and mixed up some glue into a cheap spray bottle from B&Q - I think it was about 5 parts water to 1 part PVA. I sprayed it over one of the boards and I thought I'd ruined it - there were areas of white soaked flock, and I panicked that the PVA wasn't watered down enough so added more water and was a lot more careful on other two boards, trying not to get too much on. I dabbed the excess glue off the rock areas (the glue would help protect the paint on them so I wasn't too worried about it) and let them a few days to dry. Then a couple more days. Then brought them onto the dining table to dry more as it was taking a long time in the garage.



And I was suprised by the result. The first board I sprayed, that I thought was ruined, was the best of the three; all the flock was solidly held in place, no patchiness, and looked great. The other two boards the flock had areas where it fell off to the touch, and wasn't quite the same colour as the first one. I'd read the PVA could darken the flock a little, and given that some was coming off I decided to respray them with more glue - and that was the best decision I'd made so far, they dried and looked just the same shade of green as the first board and appeared just as hard wearing.

And so onto the other 3 boards. I decided to speed up the process and skip the ochre drybrush, and also not to wait a few days for the paint to dry; surely I could just leave it overnight and it'd be fine. I prepped them in the same way as before - filler in the skull pits, raw umber over most of it, grey on the rocks, left a few hours to dry then added blotches of yellow, brown, and grey to the rocks with some nuln oil. Left long enough to dry so that the rocks could be drybrushed.



And the same process for gluing on flock. Watered down PVA, add flock by hand with lighter patches around the rocks, random darker ones, 50/50 mix over most of the board.



Let overnight to dry, brushed off the excess flock on the rocks. Mixed up a fresh batch of watered down PVA, soaked the boards, and left it overnight. But little did I know that it was going to be really cold that night, and what effect that would have on the PVA...

Went to check on the boards a couple of days later, and was met by disaster! Rather than the glue drying clear, it was white all over the place. It looked like melted snow all over the grass!



Searching on Google I found out that PVA glue needs to be kept above 5C or otherwise it can cure white, known as "chalking". As it had been 0C for those couple of days I'd basically ruined the boards by soaking them in glue. The flock wasn't bonded properly, and I thought I'd have to strip it all off and start again. But digging around a bit more I read that warming it up might help, and that water can reactivate the glue, and decided to try spraying the boards with hot water - the atomising of the water from the sprayer in the cold air would cool it, but I was hoping it would stay warm enough for the glue to cure properly. The whiteness disappeared almost immediately, and I brought the boards inside onto the dining room table, there was no way I was going to risk them getting too cold again.

And next morning I was met with three dry boards that have cured fully. They're the same colour as the first 3, and the flock has bonded into a firm surface. All that remains is to turn the former skull pits into pools of stagnant water, and I've got some epoxy resin samples with paint added that I'm waiting overnight to see how they set. Once they're done I'll get some photos of the entire board laid out with some of my 40k figures and vehicles on, and I'm aiming to have some games of 40k with friends in a few days so I need to get it finished.

It's not over yet though, as I also recently picked up the Forge World Imperial Strongpoint tile which will need painting and flocking to match the other boards ...

Got up this morning eager to put the resin into the former skull pits. Mixed up 120ml (with hindsight might have only need to mix up about 90ml), added 3 drops of Zealot Yellow AP Speedpaint to give it a yellowy stagnant tinge (more like urine!) and carefully poured into each of the four pits. I wanted to try to get it to look natural, some of the grey rocks were below the level I wanted so they would be submerged, and the larger cracks would have some water too. Poured a little at a time and pushed it around with the stirring stick, trying to get into the edges without putting too much in. The grey rocks under the surface just about show up the yellow in the resin (again the photos don't look like it does by eye), and while there might be a few tiny bubbles they'll work as bubbling gas from rotting material in the bottom of the ponds.



Once it sets I'll get all six boards clipped together and lay them out on the dining table for photos. I guess I'd better start looking at painting some infantry, otherwise it'll be waves of grey figures marching over the wasteland.

The board is complete! My dining table isn't quite 48" wide but it's supports enough of the tiles that they won't fall off, and the clips will hold them together. Thought I'd add a few models for scale.