Like many wargamers, I have been sucked in by Sludge - or more accurately, FG had been sucked in, and had pulled me down as well.
It's not a very large investment for me figures-wise, as I already own a large WOTR force, many of which can be used in the game "as is"; I simply needed to paint 27 musket-armed figures. The base you see above are made using the Perry WOTR infantry bodies and heads, with their ACW arms. The line infantry in Sludge is supposed to be based three to a 50mm round base, but I decided to stick to a square basing as the rest of my WOTR army are on square basing. I am trying a new system of painting them, which is faster than my usual way, but gives a rather grimy appearance, which is acceptable in Sludge aesthetics.
What I was more excited about though was making terrain for the project, specifically gabion defences. I bought three packs of the Renedra gabions for this project, only to realise that they are much bigger than I imagined. I made seven redoubt sections, and one gun emplacement, which is shown here with the artillery and crew from my WOTR collection.
The design is inspired by this piece, although I have orientated the planks perpendicularly because it seemed to make more sense.
The base is made with PVC foam board. The wooden sections are balsa wood stained with a wood stain. The texturing is Modge Podge Matte with sand and gravel over them. The rocks on the sides are cork pieces.
I am quite happy with how the piece turned out. I think drybrushing with light grey is the secret here.
4 comments:
Fantastic terrain piece, and I love the idea of retinue troops with muskets.
Maybe it's the camera angle, the artillerist with the linstock has the look of a droog from "A Clockwork Orange".
You've set my mind racing on whether planks should run across or along the lines of the gun's recoil.
I don't have a definitive answer, but suspect any gun platform would have several layers of plank, each perpendicular to the one below.
Given the temporary nature of some of these emplacements the answer may simply be "Whichever direction suited the available timber size".
Looking great! we are getting there!
My instinct is that it should run perpendicular; were the planks to run parallel, only two will actually support the wheels, making the system more like rails.
There are arguments for either direction.
I'm basing this on several layers laid in alternate orientations.
Perpendicular (to direction of fire):
Easier for aiming, and, if suitably rough might go some way to reducing recoil.
Drawback that is suitably rough, platform and carriage may be damaged by the recoil.
Parallel (to direction of fire):
Smoother (rail like) surface to run gun in and out.
May suffer form gun rolling under its own weight, complicating aiming.
An interesting reference here: http://www.syler.com/SiegeWarfare/digging2/cannon2cannon.html
The picture shows one advantage of perpendicular planking that had not occurred to me.
It is easier to create a "contoured" platform.
This allows an up-ramp behind to reduce the gun's recoil distance and ease running back.
Alternately a down ramp could create a crude version of the "disappearing ordnance" (at the expense of hard work running the guns back up.
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