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Large Second Age Elven ruined building.

The subject of the model under construction in this article is supposed to represent a largish Elven building from sometime in the Second Age, which has now fallen into ruin.

Materials and components used.

GW Gothic Ruins kits x 2.                            MDF baseboard 18 x 12 x 9mm.               Thick Card or Foam Core sheet.

6" Plaster Pillar Cake decorations x 3.        GW Static Grass.                                      GW Sand or Granite chippings.

Lichen.                                                        Flock, Green and Earth Brown.                Plasticard approx 2mm thick.

Polystyrene Ceiling tile.                              Two Pack Epoxy Resin.                            Poly Cement or Liquid Poly etc.

PVA adhesive.                                             Grey Acrylic Car primer.                           Purity Seal varnish.

                                  Paints used.                                   

Codex Grey.                                                Fortress Grey.                                          Scorched Brown.

Vermin Brown.                                            Chaos Black.                                            Skull White.

Jade Green.                                                Golden Yellow.                                        Bleached Bone.                       

Introduction... 

The building was originally intended to be fixed onto a piece of thick card or foam core sheet, approx 16" x 10".  However as with all best laid plans, this had to be modified during the construction of the building, as the foam core sheet that I used as a base board rapidly warped and turned into the shape of a banana, as the base started to dry out.  I rectified this problem by gluing my foam core base onto a 18" x 12" sheet of 9mm MDF board.  I used 9mm MDF as I had seen similar warping problems with 6mm MDF, when it was heavily textured. 

However, by using the 9mm MDF, this has allowed me to make the construction modular, additional buildings or ruins etc can be added to make an even larger construction, all of which will be interchangeable with each other.

The plaster pillars used in this article should be available from any shop that sell cake decorations, the ones I used were 6" in height, but there are 3" versions of them as well.  The plaster pillars are much better than the plastic versions, they cut up easily, look more realistic and look to be more in scale than the plastic ones. 

Stage 1...

Take the 2 GW Gothic Ruins kits, remove all of the parts from the sprue, cut or file off any flash, and assemble as normal, BUT, do not glue the upper floor sections into place in the corners, you will need these later.  I used M.E.K. (Methyl Ethyl Keytone), to glue the parts together, but you can use any Polystyrene Cement or Liquid Poly for this job.  

You should now have 8 wall sections, 4 large and 4 smaller ones, and several small rubble parts.  Take your base board and lay out the 8 sections on this how you want your building to look.  Mark out with a pencil where the sections will sit on the baseboard.  Glue them into position when you are happy, using Two Pack Epoxy Resin, place and glue the smaller rubble bits into a suitable position.

Stage 2...

Take your three 6" cake decoration pillars and saw them about 1" or so from the bottom of the base, when you are about 1/2 to 3/4 way through cutting them, slightly twist the saw, this will cause the pillar to break, but, it will not break cleanly, however, you want this to happen, as this will have the effect of making the surface uneven and the break will look much more realistic.  Do the same at the other end, you will then be left with a central column with no base.  Cut this pillar into smaller sections, how many is up to you, I went for cutting them in half to create two fallen sections.  Choose a suitable position for the pillars to sit and glue the base and fallen pillars into place using the Two Pack Epoxy Resin.

Stage 3...

You now need the corner floor sections that you did not use before when assembling the wall sections. You need to cut up these sections to create floor tiles.  They cut up quite easily, by simply scoring them along the line between each tile with a sharp craft knife, then bending the tile where it has been scored, the tile will now break quite easily.  Cut up all of the sections until you have a pile of separate floor tiles.  You will need to file all of edges of the cut tiles to smooth them off.  Take your Plasticard, I used some small pieces that I had lying around, which happened to be the same thickness as the GW corner floor part, approx 2mm thick or so.  Using one of the full tiles you have just cut up from the corner floor section as a template, make some more floor tiles, I cut up about 20 or so.  Now decide where about you want to lay the tiles, and glue them into position, with Two Pack epoxy resin. 

You now need the Polystyrene ceiling tile, cut strips about 5mm wide and cut or break them into small rubble sized pieces.  Glue these into position all around the bottom of the wall sections and a few pieces randomly scattered around the baseboard.  

Click to enlarge

Stage 4...

With all of the assembled parts fully dry, you will need to texture the base of the ruins.  I wanted to have only a partially tiled floor, as this would enhance the overall effect of the ruin, by having different textures and colours on the floor.  Cover the areas of the base that are not tiled with slightly thinned PVA adhesive and sprinkle GW Sand or Granite chippings, (which is what I used), over the PVA.  Leave overnight to dry completely.  Hopefully your base board will not warp at this point, as my original one did!!!!

Click to enlarge

Stage 5...

With the base now fully dry, I primed the wall and floor sections with grey acrylic car primer. Leave to dry for an hour or so before moving onto the next painting step.

The next step is to undercoat all of the area's that are stone with a Mid to Dark Grey undercoat.  I mixed enough paint for the job in an empty jar, (I always keep the old paint jars and do not throw them away, just for this purpose), Codex Grey and Chaos Black at a mix of 75% to 25% was mixed in the jar and applied to all of the stone parts, wall sections, rubble and floor tiles.

When the grey undercoat is fully dry, mix up a dark brown undercoat for the earth between the floor tiles and around the edge of the building.  I used a mix of 85% Scorched Brown with 15% Chaos black for my undercoat colour, now paint all of the area's of Earth. 

Click to enlarge

Stage 6...

When the Earth undercoat is dry, it is now time to dry brush all of the stone work, pillars, floor tiles etc. I added a small amount of Fortress Grey into the Grey undercoat mix, and dry brushed all of the stone area's of the ruin, (this is another reason to mix your paint in jars, as you do not have to try to remix the undercoat colour).

Add a little more Fortress Grey into the mix, and dry brush all of the stone area's again.  Now add a small amount of Bleached Bone into the mix and dry brush all of the stone area's again.  Add a little more Bleached Bone and a small amount of Skull White into the mix and dry brush again.  

Finally mix 50% Fortress Grey and 50% Skull White and very very lightly dry brush all of the stone area's.

Mix 50% Scorched Brown and 50% Vermin Brown and dry brush all of the Earth on the floor, mix in a little Golden yellow into the mix and dry brush again. It does not matter if your Brown goes onto the stone work when you dry brush, in fact this will make the whole effect more realistic.  Now mix Vermin Brown and Golden Yellow together, about 60% - 40% should do it, and lightly dry brush this mix onto the Earth.  Add a small amount of Jade Green into the mix, now very lightly dry brush this over the Earth.  

Finally, very lightly dry brush Jade Green over the Earth and the bottom of the wall sections, pillars, floor tiles etc, mix in a very small amount of Golden Yellow and dry brush again.  This will represent weathering, discoloration of the stone work and moss growth, and give the whole model an extra dimension and depth.

Click to enlarge

Stage 7...

Now add the Static Grass in between the floor tiles, on top of the pillars and around the ruin etc.  I used flock around the outer edges of the MDF base board, but you can use Static Grass instead.  Apply slightly thinned PVA and scatter the Green Flock onto the PVA, then lightly scatter Earth Brown into the Green to blend the colours together, this will hide any sharp edges that applying the green flock created.  When everything is dry, give the whole model a coat of Purity Seal varnish.

Click to enlarge

And there you have it, one large ruined building for use in your LOTR tabletop battles.  The cost of the project came to about £25.00 for the component parts and all materials used.  When you see the size of the building it is definitely good value for your money.  However you will need to spend a good few hours of your time to construct this model, but I think that the results are worth the effort.

I hope that you have enjoyed this article and it inspires you to build something similar.