by LuckGod

Hello!

Some of you might already know who I am. If you don’t, I’m a Gobber in a suit of Trencher armour who paints minis, does conversions, and makes terrain.  And I’m delighted to talk you through how to make minefields for your WARMACHINE/HORDES table!

The idea to make this terrain piece came from my desire to have a Trencher-themed table. I love the look of a fully painted Trencher army facing off against some invading force, and having a table full of thematic terrain really adds something special to that.

For this project, you will need the following items

• MDF sheet
• mine markers
• white glue
• sand & paint

Start by cutting out bases for your minefields. I would suggest no larger than five inches across, but if you want to make a colossal mine field, who am I to stop you?

Bevel the edges of these base templates to provide a smoother transition between your tabletop and the terrain. This should make it look better and make it easier to balance models partway on the terrain.

Lay out your mine tokens on the base templates. Play around with their placement until you get a random pattern that feels right to you. Don’t feel the need to crowd them in.

We will be adding craters soon as well, so leave some spaces for those.

Next, let’s add some realistic uneven ground to the terrain, as a minefield, during a battle, would hardly be perfectly level.

To create the uneven ground cheaply and easily, I used Polyfilla—spackle in the U.S.

Pile up a small amount of it in a gap between some of the mines.

Use a rounded object (in this particular case, an old paint pot) to push into the filler in order to create the crater. I found it important to wet the top of the pot or else the filler will come up the pot!

After removing the pot, smooth down the edges of the crater to give it a more natural look.

This is the end result for this terrain template. I partially covered a couple of the mines to add some variety, though in the real world, we know mines would be completely hidden. But for this terrain, it needs to be clear to both players what the terrain represents, so some suspension of reality is required (in our game of steam-powered robots and rabid beasts!).

Copy the process across the other terrain bases.

Next, apply a thick layer of glue to everything except the mine themselves and pour on mixed-sized sand.

After the glued on sand has fully dried—I waited a day just to be sure—paint it.

I used the same brown I use when painting the basing of my miniatures. Making your basing and terrain match is a great way to make things look as if they belong together on the battlefield. I used some thinned-down black to make the earth in the craters look burnt by an explosion.

Paint the mines silver and bronze.

The type of sand I use has tiny flakes of sea shell mixed into it. Normally, I pick these out but in this project, I left them in and carefully emphasized them out some silver paint to make them look like shrapnel.

With the painting finished, I added a layer of water effects resin to the bottom of each crater. I imagine the battlefield as a muddy, churned-up field, so water would naturally accumulate in them.

This is, of course, very much so an optional step. If you don’t have any water effect, don’t feel like you have to rush out and get some. It is a great way, however, to get some experience using it in a situation where you have no risk of ruining a miniature’s paint job!

Last, add patches of somber-looking dead grass. Use whatever grass or flock you normally use to match your army.

And it’s as simple as that!

But what good are the minefield terrain pieces without rules?

Well, I have you covered in that regard! Feel free to use this terrain type in your games. Though it is not in the Steamroller document, it makes a fun variation for narrative/casual games.

RULES: A model without Flight or Incorporeal enters or ends its movement within the Minefield, roll a D6. On a 5 or 6, the model suffers a POW 12 blast damage roll. If the model ran or charged this turn, add +1 to the initial roll.

If a model with Flight is knocked down or loses Flight while within the Minefield, roll a D6 to determine if it detonates a mine. On a 5 or 6, a mine detonates, and the model suffers a POW 12 blast damage roll.

You can buy packs of mine markers from Privateer Press online store.

I hope you found this terrain tutorial interesting. Please let me know your thoughts!

If you want to check out some of the other terrain I have made for my WARMACHINE and HORDES table, you can find links to them here:

https://luckgod84.blogspot.com/p/terrain-showcase.html

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