Micro terrain for the campaign, or, Math and Pizza boxes

 

 Actually the cardboard is from one of those boxes delivered to my door by Amazon, or Fedex, or UPS or... you get the picture.

If you have read any posts of the last few month months, you have seen the cardboard sheet  used to protect the dining table.  Drab but useful, easy to cover up with enough prep. 

  Typical game in progress. Note the lack of enough prep to cover it up.

 

 

 For prior micro armor games we tried out four inch wide hexagons, as per the rules we were using.  These were a combination of Roger's and my efforts.

 

 

 

 

Seems like a year ago....oh September 2022, how time flies. Note no cardboard here, the underlayment was a piece of buff felt.

 

 But this time around we were using micro armor and 7 Days to the River Rhine. And were slaving to the old CPQ maps. Something would have to give.

These are examples of how to lay out the terrain by hex type for the campaign; each hexagon is to be 20 inches from 'flat to flat' on the table.  Very useful .  Very crowded, such as the terrain depicted was at the time.

The issue is how to faithfully produce several hexagons (and partial hexagons) from the map to the table without spending -time and money- beyond what can be done in the prep effort.  When the player showed up, I stated I had spared no expense setting the table. The silent looks they gave me were priceless.  Don't think they were that impressed with my frugality.  A friend called  on seeing it "pizza-box  game" evidently from his squandered youth.

 

What came to the rescue was some craft foam originally meant for Crossfire! that was still in the cellar  ....never throw anything away. Except really fuzzy stuff in the refrigerator.

 Any way, you can probably guess the terrain key: blue is water,  green is forest, buff is for fields and dark brown is for both roads and built up areas (small rectangles) . The green and red monopoly buildings denote light and heavier construction of the buildings. The foam itself is light, bendable, does not stretch, can take paint and some glues, light and was cheap enough......I bought it all ten plus years ago. The base color of the box denotes open territory.

And-underneath it all you can see the trusty stand by cardboard, now with trusty hand drawn --- well with a straight edge and protractor, hexagons.  20 inches across flat to flat. Two hours to get it right and permanent marker outlined. (The geometric construction techniques are buried deep in this one, Yoda would say.)

What a lot of bother to explain away the look of the game.  Thank you for you patience.