Wednesday, April 1, 2015

Hex-based River Project: Fail!

*Sigh*

Last night, I cleaned off a small table that I plan to play some small mircoarmor games to compare various modern rule sets. I had mentioned my plans to do this some time ago. Anyway, I laid down the finished river hexes to figure out how I wanted the river to go for these games. When I did, they looked awful in terms of how warped they were! I guess carpet is far more forgiving; but on a hard, flat surface, they really looked bad. It looks like some major geological faulting occurred on the battlefield! More importantly, they would be impractical. Even if I taped them down, they would rock around. They also didn't fit well together because of the warping.

I couldn't bear to throw them in the trash. Its not like it cost much to make them: $4 for two sheets of foamcore, and about $3 for the tube of latex caulk. It was the time I put into them and my little mini-hex forests; that is pretty much all I've worked on for the last several months. My hobby time is limited to an hour or two at night, and that's only if I don't have grading to do, or am just too tired to do anything. So, I stuck them in a plastic bag and found a spot for them on a shelf.

I guess plan B is to use the caulk directly. No mounting them on anything. You'd have to give me a good argument to do so, or guarantee on pain of death that the material you suggest won't warp.  I don't want any warping. Just say "NO!" to warping.

Like it or not, the saga of river building continues....

3 comments:

  1. 1mm plasticard might be warp-proof?

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  2. I second Paul's recommendation. I use scrap polystyrene from food packaging as a base… no warping.

    Good post by the way. So often people only post their successes when there's so much more to learn from our failures.

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  3. Gentlemen,
    Thanks for the comments. Your comments are the kind that makes the online gaming community worthwhile.

    Pahoota, I'm drawing a blank on products with polystyrene that haven't been molded to cradle the food item. I've been buying For Sale signs at Walmart for cheap styrene sheets. I could try these.

    Thanks for the compliment!

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