Making Rivers for 6mm, Part 1

In a previous post, I was babbling on about my need for more terrain, specifically, more forests. After looking at the map for the first battle of the Second Chalupistan War, I decided to start making rivers.

I wanted to avoid the usual strips of rivers. They are probably easier to make, but they look too much like water canals. Plus, I thought each segment might be a little more stable on the table top. I used the plastic powder holders that I talked about in that previous post as a template and cut out a whole bunch of hexes.

Template to make the hexes. As usual, the 15mm Corporate Suit
tries to direct the hex-making operations.

I then decided on how wide my rivers should be and make a template so that the width of the rivers would be consistent.

After marking the widths at the edges, I drew the river boundaries, scored them with an X-acto knife, and then peeled off the paper. I then scraped and gouged out some of the exposed foam as seen below:

Rivers are rarely straight for any great distances (putting my geology degree to good use), so I also made a number of curves. In addition to scraping and gouging, I took the back of a paint brush and pushed in some lines paralleling the banks:

I also decided to make some that are double hexed, figuring that it would avoid the individual pieces to shift around too much while on the gaming table.

Double-hex straightaway. The 15s came out to inspect the work.

I am not sure why, but the hexes became slightly warped. Not enough when I looked at each hex individually, but it was apparent when I laid them down on the table end to end. It seems to be due to the removal of the overlying paper and some of the foam because the strike (another geology term) of the warping runs the length of the river.  To fix this, I gently cracked each hex along the length of the river. It was just enough to do the trick, but the hex still maintains its integrity and isn't floppy. The crack isn't even really visible, but I put a tread of PVA glue along it. The glue didn't seem to re-warp the hexes.

The next phase involves building up and painting them. I don't plan to build them up too much, just a little along the banks. I hope that whatever I do to them doesn't warp them further.