More on Heroscape Terrain

A typical Biblical era Middle Eastern building - the basic style is still in use today in certain quarters

The ease of playing Command and Colours/Memoir of Battle style games on a Heroscape battle board has made me more determined than ever to produce a desert style set up and to acquire some representative terrain for use with the whole thing. I am committed to using 1/300^th scale trees but buildings are proving to be a slight headache. Originally I was looking to use 1/300^th buildings – at least the smallest examples thereof – but I am uncertain about the size element of even the smallest examples. Instead I am now looking at using Monopoly sized houses/hotels as these are simple enough to both acquire and paint up and have the big advantage of having a small footprint.

A slightly more palatial abode

Building for the Middle East will be easy enough to knock up for the smaller scale terrain – I am thinking using the small, two stud Lego style MegaBlok suitably tweaked and painted – as they are essentially just a rectangular block in design. Even I would struggle to make a mess of such a building....;-)

A typical Middle Eastern town - certainly too large for what I want but the effect is very pleasing to look at all the same

I am thinking that I may well need to acquire another base set of Heroscape in order to provide additional blank tiles for conversion into a desert set in order to be able to run with the 9 x 13 x 9 idea I have been messing about with. The jury is still out at the moment in connection with acquiring the desert version of Hexon simply because the cost is not one I want to be meeting at the present. An entry level set up will set me back the best part of £150 which is by no means a fortune but is more than the budget can currently absorb.

Monopoly houses and a hotel (note the reversed colours!) which may well provide the basis for western style buildings. The two stud Lego style MegaBloks will probably suffice for the Middle Eastern versions

The armies to go with this collection are moving along nicely – I have but two sets of modern weapons to finish labelling, red and blue – and so the vehicle labels will be undertaken very soon. One thing I will need to do now though, is to decommission some of the existing blocks in order to have them available for the additional units. I went rather over the top originally in terms of units available, far more than I would be likely to use on a standard 13 x 9 hex battlefield and so at least 40 blocks from each set (times six colours remember!) will be stripped in readiness for their new roles. I will have a surplus of blocks left over after this which will be handy as I have an idea for their used in conjunction the six additional boxes I recently acquired and that merely need chopping up. In fact, if I opted to go with the 1/4 and 3/4 cut for the blocks the 1/4 section is the ideal shape and size for use as the basis of a simple Middle Eastern building so this may well prove to be a good alternative to the plastic bricks mentioned.

Much to ponder methinks.