Maybe Not Complete After All...

So after having declared the Robotech/Sixmillopolis setup complete and started looking into new projects, naturally the next thing I end up working on is additional Robotech stuff.

As mentioned in my previous blog post I was having difficulty finding somewhere that would cut MDF tiles to 8" x 8" for me. Well I had also told a friend this... and the next time I saw him he handed me a stack of 8" x 8" tiles he had cut with his power saw at home. The tiles are hardboard rather than MDF (which he couldn't find in 1/8th inch), but that doesn't matter. They're more than structurally strong enough, and size wise they fit in perfectly. Once finished they are indistinguishable (from above) from the MDF.

New tiles checker-boarded with the old to check size match

So much thanks Todd, I owe you a beer or two. And since he'd been kind enough to make that effort it seemed appropriate to complete tiles for at least the buildings I already had. After trying out a few different layouts, I settled on a set that mostly filled 4 tiles. The tiles are based, so now it's on to detailing and highlighting the buildings.

New layouts I settled on, all suburban tiles

The other addition to Sixmillopolis I've started is some water sections, which could be laid out as either a river or a coastline. While at a craft store picking up some other materials, I discovered they sold 1/8th plywood in 12" x 4". Which was absolutely perfect. Two of these side by side will match the 8" of my city tiles. Two placed end to end will match 3 city tiles. And 4 or 6 lined up will cover the short/long edges of a standard 6' x 4' gaming table.

Work in progress river sections

In the image above pairs of water sections have been placed next to each other forming a river (the goal is to make at least 12, so as to have the option of a river running the long dimension of the board), but they could also be placed individually to create a shoreline. Stretch goals after that could include things like bends, lakes, river mouths... there are a lot of possibilities.

One big challenge for the river sections is that it will be the first time I have tried making a water feature. The technique I'm going to trial is to paint the feature in whatever shade of blue or blue/green wanted, then apply multiple layers of gloss varnish to get a water look.

In addition to expanding Sixmillopolis, opportunistic lurking on a few gaming web-stores turned up a box of Zentraedi artillery battlepods at a decent price, which were duly ordered. They arrived and have been assembled as two light artillery battlepods and two particle-beam cannon battlepods.

So for the next little while at least these new additions will be what I'm working on. But after that I'll be back to deciding on a new project. I'm extremely pleased with how Sixmillopolis has turned out, and on the one hand after having put so much time into it, it seems a shame not to find something that lets me use it as much as possible. On the other hand, I've been working on 6mm stuff for a while now and feeling like a change of pace - maybe something in 15mm or some naval or space stuff. This second thought is likely to win out. After all, Sixmillopolis isn't going anywhere, and I can always come back and use it as part of another 6mm project in future.