The Dwarven city of Belegost

Dagorlad · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:19 pm

Belegost, Gabilgathol in the Dwarvish tongue, the name means "Great Fortress." The city was one of two founded in the First Age in the eastern side of the Ered Luin (Blue Mountains). At the height of the War of Wrath, the land of Beleriand was rent asunder and the sea consumed all that lay before the ramparts of the Ered Luin. The Dwarven city of Nogrod was ruined in the cataclysm, but Belegost survived for the most part.

I have had a desire to build a Dwarven ruin complex for some time now, but rather than build (yet) another Moria board, I thought perhaps an outdoor ruin would be interesting. The twin cities of Nogrod and Belegost sprang to mind, as they survived into the Third Age in one form or another. While playing Skyrim on my XBox and marvelling at the richness of the game-designer's vision I was awe-struck by the city of Markarth and spent many hours just walking around it and looking at every facet of it from all angles - it was exactly the sort of place that would suit my idea of the entrance to Belegost.

So I have begun the process of building a city loosely based on the layout of the Skyrim city, but using the architectural style of Alan Lee and Jeremy Bennett from the Fellowship of the Ring movie.

The pictures below show my initial progress and, as it's a little hard to explain what the final model is going to look like, I've included a shot of the scene from the Skyrim game.

Click each thumbnail to biggify.

Oldman Willow · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 1:55 pm

I clearly need to play more video games :!:

That will be awesome

Erurainon the Trombonist · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:04 pm

I'm sure it will look great when it's done!

Constantine · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:08 pm

Can you be posting your progress and I may be asking for too much but could you also be explaining how to make this magnificent city? Or there is another alternative, when you have completed the project you can tell us where you live and I can steal it lol. I hope it turns out the way you envision it:) You gave me inspiration but I have practically no experience at terrain.

garmenhord · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 2:53 pm

Looks great so far! Looking forward for more! Trying to resist to make some terrain myself! I just don't got the space left for it.

Red Corsairs · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 4:33 pm

Excellent progress so far Alan. Your terrain is always amazing and I can't wait to see how this turns out after taking influences from the Dwarven architecture from the LotR universe and the Dwemer architecture of the Elder Scrolls universe.

king elessar 2615 · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 6:35 pm

this is ure to be an interesting terrain peice, cant wait to see it finished

, im also so glad that someone is deriving influences from skyrim as i was completely blown away by the structures and thought they would make great terrain for LOTR :-D

theavenger001 · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 10:51 pm

Whoo! Some more stunning terrain is on the way. I will follow this thread closely.

Dagorlad · **Posted:** Sun Jun 10, 2012 11:25 pm

Thanks for the encouragement guys. As usual I have a number of projects on the go at the moment, but I really want to keep the momentum up on this one.

Dagorlad · **Posted:** Mon Jun 11, 2012 1:54 am

And after all that encouragement I managed to do a little bit more this morning.

The stairs shown in my earlier post need to sit raised above the level of the river as it cascades down the mountain side. In order to do this I have cut a base out of some 25mm styrofoam and clamped it to an MDF base. I base everything with wood these days, as styrofoam is easily damaged and the MDF gives it some additional sturdiness. Unfortunately, I still haven’t found an inexpensive adhesive that really bonds well with the foam. PVA does ok but takes days to dry. Sticking with what I know (hehe, sticking, I crack me up), I used PVA to glue the foam to the base and clamped it together – I’ll leave it until next weekend to set properly.

PowerofWill · **Posted:** Mon Jun 11, 2012 2:24 am

Looks really good! I wish I was as good as you are with terrain. I can't wait to see it finished!

-PoW

Wah Wing · **Posted:** Mon Jun 11, 2012 5:54 am

Oh wow! What inspiration you always give to us! Great work as always!

Can we see some models for scale?

TheBucklandBrewer · **Posted:** Mon Jun 11, 2012 8:18 am

Over the past few years you've done some really awesome projects which were always a pleasure to follow!
This one is no less! Looking forward to see the board making progress!!
You always make me feel like making one for myself (while I don't have the space... yet...).

Looking good (using this simple word for now so I can keep the "awesome's and 'brilliant's" in a later stage or I would run out of compliments in a few days) so far mate! And interesting source of inspiration!!!

Sticky Fingersss · **Joined:** Sat Oct 09, 2010 11:20 am **Posts:** 1776

that truley looks like an epic board!

cal585 · **Posted:** Mon Jun 11, 2012 12:17 pm

Consider me subscribed! It's looking great

Dorthonion · **Posted:** Tue Jun 12, 2012 11:23 am

I sense another masterpiece in the making.

Drumstick · **Joined:** Sat Sep 19, 2009 8:57 am **Posts:** 1223

whoah some more dagorlad terrain! Funnily enough I've gained a lot of inspiration from Skyrim too, have you seen the giant lotr mod being worked on at the moment? Good work so far, always great to see more dwarven terrain as there is not enough of it.

Drum

warhammergamingnl · **Joined:** Sat Nov 05, 2011 9:06 pm **Posts:** 215

Looks like an awesome project to me

Good luck, what you got looks really nice and detailed

lorderkenbrand · **Posted:** Tue Jun 12, 2012 2:00 pm

Always a treat to see your works in progress Alan, you make the polyfilla carving technique seem so easy. No criticisms from me yet

Can't wait to see more!

Eaothen-the-brave · **Posted:** Tue Jun 12, 2012 5:45 pm

Great work! Can't wait to see how this turns out! Maybe I'll steal some ideas for my own Moria terrain.. :twisted:

The Dwarven city of Belegost

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