Due to a number of matters outside of our control, my usual group of gamers has been very inactive recently, and this has been reflected here on these pages.  I though as a change I might post a few little reviews of some terrain I have in most cases recently received. Even more so because I enjoy sharing excellent products and traders with others!

At this year’s Guns of August I decided that I was no longer satisfied with my scenery.  A few years ago I purchased a couple of yards of a green felt that I had intended to paint up as a ground cloth for Wings of War.  I never actually completed that painting, and instead, the cloth became destined for other purposes.  While it is no inexpensive craft store felt and a far better color than most felts it is still a large expanse of green with little variation.  With a lot of terrain feature placed upon it this is not such a problem, but at Guns I had a table mostly free of such things, and I was very disappointed with the result.

So, the first thing I looked at to improve matters was that cloth.  I could have broken the featureless expanse by airbrushing varies colors but I didn’t trust my artistic abilities.  Instead, I looked to two commercial sources.  These were Cigar Box Battle Store and Game Matz.

The club uses some of both of these fine products.  The Cigar  Box mats are beautifully painted cloth whereas the Game Matz are printed on heavyweight vinyl and many are photo realistic.  For various reasons I decided to purchase the Game Matz  Grassy Battlefield mat, though I do intend to purchase some Cigar Box Mats in the future.

These mats are beautiful.  Some of you may have seen the Dark Forest mat by the same producer in many of my Pulp Alley posts.  Chris also owns a sea mat.  All of these are excellent quality, durable and waterproof.  They are too stiff to drape over terrain, so any hills or mountains have to be fully flocked and placed on top.

I have been relying on roads by Ricks Scenics and am very pleased with them, but recently need double the amount I had available.  This became a challenge because the company is no more.  Flying Pig Terrain took over production but they now are on hiatus!

I needed a lot of roads, wanted them to look good but didn’t want to spend a lot of money since I have already a good deal of rather expensive Ric Scenic Cobblestones!  Fleabay and War World Scenics to the rescue.

These roads were a very good price even with shipping from England.  They are not all a perfect match to each other color wise but they are far closer looking in person than the above pictures would suggest.  The appear to be a material very similar to roofing tiles but much thinner (at least thinner to those in the United States) with nicely flocked edges.  I bought two sets, one was simply straights and the other a bunch of useful pieces (smaller straights, turns, intersections, etc.).  These are very flexible, nice looking and will play the part of any metalled or asphalt roads I need, leaving my Ric Scenics for cobblestone and dirt roads.  I will be buying some more of these as I need a slip the other direction and I would like to cut some of the turns and straights to give me more choices.

While looking for these roads I stumbled on some beautiful hedges.  I wasn’t in the market for these, but hedges are always useful.

These also were on Fleabay, sold by Treefella1.  For about $4o USD I received over 200 inches of hedges! I have no idea what material is giving these their bulk, but they are flocked and based upon cardstock.  The gates are very nice.

Very pleased with these.  They did take a while to get here, and I am concerned about how durable they might be (the box it filled with flocking that has already come off) but I am far from disappointed.  These were far less money than equal quality products I have seen elsewhere, well worth the wait and I can reflock them if they ever need it!  i don’t see how I will ever need any more hedges!

The next items are NOT new, but I decided to add them as I am so very pleased with them

First, Hotz Mats fields.

These are made in two different scale sizes, mine are the 20mm to 30mm set.  They are just felt with flocking in rows but make some of the sweetest plowed fields I have ever seen.  His sets in this scale come with four in various sizes and they are available in two different “seasons”.  His delivery times can sometimes be slow, but the product is inexpensive and worth the wait. $13 USD for a set at the time of posting.

They do only come in squares and rectangles but one could easily purchase an extra set to cut up to form triangular pieces to make the squares fit into odd shaped areas.  These are completely flexible and lay flat.

Just a few shots with some vehicles and a Charlie Foxtrot house to show all of these elements together.

Cheers untill next time,

Ron