Some time ago Rich Uncle Pat decided to dive into the American Revolutionary War via the Warlord Epic Scale minis. He has spent the last many months laboriously painting the forces for the Battle of Bunker Hill (what better way to start a new period than with the very first real battle of the conflict). As he is approaching completion of that job I offered to build the terrain that he might need. I am currently painting the buildings that came with the minis but, if we are to refight the Battle of Bunker hill, it seemed incumbent upon us to have a hill (I was actually warming up to build the whole peninsular but that idea got shot down). To my dismay I found out that R.U.P. intended to place the hills underneath the game mat. That left only the redoubt thrown up by the Patriot forces on Breed's Hill. This I was allowed to build.
For a small battle that was so well documented there is a bewildering assortment of maps of the fight. Precious few agree on the size, shape or exact placement of the significant terrain features, Happily they do agree on shape and approximate size of the simple earthwork that crowned Breed's Hill on the fateful day.
Some fiddling had to be dome to accommodate the Warlord bases but in the end R.U.P. was able to provide a plan of the work. I rubbed my hands with glee and dusted off my trusted friend, Proxxie. The earthworks could be easily made with blueboard, but where am I to find a supply of logs for the inner face of the fort? Spaghetti noodles are thin round and straight!
the plan; it just needs to be made 3-D
a few minutes with Proxxie and I had my embankments
I used the adjustable cutting angle feature to save time sanding
a little bit of cutting and trimming and it was ready to be glued down
this ought to do the trick for Epic Scale logs
the body of the earthwork was simple enough,
I built it on a chunk of heavy matte-board to give it some heft
the spaghetti noodles were a perfect choice; cheap plentiful and of tiny cross-section
all I did was slather the vertical face of the earthwork with Titebond
and then snap bits of noodle to length with my thumbnail
once things had a chance to set I gave it all a thin coat of Titebond
just needs a little drywall mud to close the gaps
and a light coat of chinchilla dust to add some texture to the surface
one pound of noodles would do for quite a considerable amount of walling
I am in the process of painting the buildings to represent Charlestown
this is proving to be harder than I thought, I'm unused to working in such a small scale
I struggled to resist the temptation to glaze the windows
Next up is texture and painting and I will move on to making the hill this will rest on.
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