Making a Display Board

I'm making a display base for the Harrowed.

The goal is to end up with a board that will conveniently hold The Harrowed -- meaning it has to be basically flat and plain. But I also want the board to nest the army in a setting that creates narrative context. In this case, I want the daemons to be swarming over a landscape that evokes an imperial temple.

I'm also using this project as an opportunity to experiment with some new (at least, new for me) terrain building techniques. Specifically, I wanted to try my hand at this method for modeling paved floors.



I started by buying a framed bulletin board for a base, and some foam core to make into a temple floor.

Then I drew a grid (for tiles) and an aquila, and started carving.


Early results were mixed. The temple floor grid looked great. The aquila kind of sucked.



So I ended up carving up a smaller "platform" and simply gluing it over my first attempt.

So now I have this:


So far, I like it. Now I'm mulling over ideas for desecrating it in some suitably "Harrowed" fashion. (Though I don't want to make it too busy, as it's just meant to be a frame for the army.)

First I need to coat the foam with watered-down PVA, to make it more durable (and to primer it without melting it).

Meanwhile, I really like this technique. I'm sensing some terrain building in my near future!