Materials

[mrken]

Best advice I can give anyone playing miniatures games. Get the biggest table you can handle. My table is a six foot by almost three foot folding table. ONe of those brown folding ones. Then, I put a 4x6 foot piece of chip board over it and clamped it down with bolts and wing nuts. Then when I get real serious, I put down two 3x6 foot pieces of this laminate board down and clamp it with the same holes. 6x6 foot is about as large a table as I can handle in my game area, but it is real sweet when I get to play on it.

[tesral]

Just don't lean on it.

I need to get about make a new table for my basement as well. The current one is a old ping pong table that is literally about to collapse. The legs are very weak. I want to see the legs further inboard as well.

[mrken]

My first table was a pool table. It was like eight foot long and was pretty cool, but the bumpers would constantly remind me of how not suitable for play (NSFP) it was, but the real problems were when I lost minis in the holes. Ugh!!! That just sucked.

My next gaming table was a ping pong table. Actually that was the best one in so many ways. It was huge! And, it folded up to put against the basement wall where it stuck out maybe a foot. It was great.

And you are right about leaning on my present table. One of my daughters friends just had to sit on it last night. lol Yeah, it started to , ah, sag. lol

[Skunkape]

I have 2 6 foot conference tables that sit side by side for the gaming room. I've been building a table but am stalled currently until I can afford to buy the parts for the lights and paint. Other than that, I'm close to completing it!

[mrken]

You ever consider blunder paint, the stuff someone orders and then finds out it is the wrong color? I got my signature bright florescent green paint that way. It is actually a primer, which makes it even better. Paid just a few bucks for a gallon. Have bought several gallons of them. Another place I get paint is from a recycler. The have a dump truck load of paint plus all kinds of other recycler stuff.

[Skunkape]

That's an idea, but might not get the colors I want!

[tesral]

If exact shade is not an issue blunder paint is a good deal. I've used it for terrain myself. "I need a green, what do you have?" and took the green that they had.

OH! Very important. Do not use solvent based paints on Styrofoam. It dissolves it. (For those that didn't know.)

[mrken]

Hey Skunk, just keep checking all the time. I am at the home store all the time and just walk by the paint department. Takes just a few moments as I walk by. When I get a gallon I break it into several plastic mayo or nut jars and mix a few other colors in to get several different shades. I will buy earth tones for the most part, greens, yellows and browns mostly, bit I also got some blues and reds.

[Skunkape]

OH! Very important. Do not use solvent based paints on Styrofoam. It dissolves it. (For those that didn't know.)

Yes, that's a very important tip!

[Anarkitty]

Here's the best tips I have for you:

• I recommend water-based primers as a base coat on styrofoam, nice and thick. Then you can spray over that all you like.
• Spray adhesives are your friend when you have to glue flat sheets of anything together. Follow the directions.
• 1/4" MDF (medium-density fiberboard) makes a great basing material for individual terrain pieces. Especially if you are going to have modular hills, the styrene gets really fragile at the edges. Gluing it down to an MDF base with beveled edges will make it last 100x longer.
• If you don't have any woodworking tools at all (a $2 coping saw cuts MDF just fine), or can't be bothered, foam-core is a good alternative, but the same thing applies: prime any exposed core material before you paint.
• For cutting styrene, a hot wire cutter is nice, but not necessary. Get a package of razor-knives (the kind with the scored, snap-off blades that click-out) from the dollar store, and extend the blade about 3/4 of the way. Don't use expensive ones for foam though. You don't need it, and it dulls the edge. Save your good ones for other things.
• Pink foam is more expensive, but significantly more durable. I highly recommend popping the extra few bucks.
• Strips of square or rectangular chicken wire or hardware cloth make quick and easy ladders and railings for sci-fi settings.
• Pringles-brand potato chip cans make good starting points for all kinds of industrial-looking terrain.
• Hot glue is good to use for alien (looks like goo) or industrial (looks like weld-seams)terrain, but watch out, it will melt styrene even through primer. Avoid super glue, it melts styrene, it is brittile, and it is expensive. If hot glue doesn't work for you, go with either wood glue or rubber cement, depending on what you're doing with it.

This is just off the top of my head, hope it helps you or someone!

[tesral]

Duco Cement, 541 and like glues are great for bonding dissimilar materials. If you have an archery shop nearby ask for original fletchtite. It is a vinyl glue that is tough and flexible. Again great for dissimilar materials including non porous to non porous. It holds plastic vanes on aluminum arrows repeatedly through the shock of launch and impact.

Old fashion carpenter's glue if you are gluing porous to porous.

Super glue is good for one thing. It makes fibrous plastic out of raw cardboard. Make cardboard thing, that gray sheet cardboard is best. use super glue to put it together, in a very well ventilated area soak the thing in super glue. A friend of my William Wardrup makes nearly everything in this manner, he is a professional modeler. He even makes working submarines from cardboard. A knife cardboard and super glue are his primary materials.

[Skunkape]

Super glue is good for one thing. It makes fibrous plastic out of raw cardboard. Make cardboard thing, that gray sheet cardboard is best. use super glue to put it together, in a very well ventilated area soak the thing in super glue. A friend of my William Wardrup makes nearly everything in this manner, he is a professional modeler. He even makes working submarines from cardboard. A knife cardboard and super glue are his primary materials.

A friend of mine makes rockets that can be launched out of cardstock, reinforced with super glue! I've seen first hand how strong the cardstock gets after coating in super glue!