Hey everybody!

I need your opinion in terrain making.

In the past I have made buildings for lots of different factions in the middle earth world, Harad houses, Osgiliath ruins, Rohan dwellings, Easterling watch towers. This is great for the odd building here and there, the problem is I can't make a township with all of these mismatched buildings.

I want to make a full town for gaming in, which could include buildings like a stable, a temple/church, palace, tavern, blacksmith, barracks and lots of houses. Potentially building palisades or city walls too.

I think making a Rhunish style town would be really amazing; since I can really stretch my imagination on this idea as Tolkien doesn't say much about this land. I have done a little research into architecture and decided a eastern Russian and eastern Asian or Tibetan mixed architecture could fit them well. (I like the city of Irkutsk in Russia)




The problem with having so much freedom in a design like this is that it is not distinctly "Lord of the rings" you can't look at these buildings and say that is from the movies, like you can if I built Osgiliath or Edoras for example. Plus you don't have scenarios that involve a Rhun town.

So I put to you guys should I go with my gut or something more normal and obvious?

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Check out my WIP> viewtopic.php?f=50&t=26737

Hour of Wolves website has a really neat coastal Harad city that is worth a look, as well as some really cool tents. I love the shape of the top building and think it would look really cool turned into an Easterling stable.

The stuff I've been reading has the Khandish as barbarians, in fact the author used old warhammer chaos marauders as Khandish proxies. If I was to model Khand, I'd go with a Norse-Mongol theme. Lots of wood boards in interesting patterns and big leather yurts. Maybe a bit of Russian/Ukranian gingerbreading, but Lake Town has this. Perhaps a bit of Japanese in the shape and style of the buildings with the snakeskin shingles would look cool.

If you look in the Hobbit making of series of books, many of the cultures are based on several real world cultures smooshed together. Many of them also have a theme animal motif: Ravens of Erebor, Fish of Lake Town, Horses of Rohan.

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"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggie' until you can find a rock." -Will Rogers

Simple question. Once you make it, what can you do with it?

Answer: Don't bother. Make something you can use.

Feh. You can totally use it. There's a really cool fan supplement at DC Hobbit league with a picture of king Aragorn on the cover. It details the blue wizards and their rise to terrorize the people of Fangorn. Since these guys spent a lot of time in the East, it goes to figure their towers and battlements are heavily Rhun inspired.

And you can use it in any scenario from the front of the Sourcebooks you want. Terrain is always useful.

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"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggie' until you can find a rock." -Will Rogers

Good point I will have to think of a animal to represent them. It I pretty obvious A DRAGON! due to all the profile named after one.

The scenery can be used in heaps of ways. Once you make helms deep you can use it in one way. A town with many buildings, they can be used in many scenarios. Only important buildings like the palace, statues and temples will not be able to proxy as other buildings in Rohan, gondor or dale.

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Check out my WIP> viewtopic.php?f=50&t=26737

Seems like you already had your mind made up before you asked the question. Good luck building it and be sure to post some WIP shots that we can all see how it's working out.

I build a lot of terrain and it's amazingly time consuming, so I limit myself to the things that I can use most often. To spend weeks on a project that I may use once or twice, is just not practical for me.

In any case, I would love to see what you come up with.

I have seen a lot of cool images in Battle Games in Middle Earth video game that I plan on using to build terrain. Just thought others on the boards might like to know. Google it and then hit "images"

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"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'nice doggie' until you can find a rock." -Will Rogers

I had those made for me be Guillermo , fron Wargfield:

http://theminiaturespage.com/boards/msg.mv?id=404443

(you have to scroll down the page)

I decided to use to different roof designs : One , akin to the buildings on your pics , and clearly on an Eastern style , to represent Rhun/easterling buildings , and the other , the one with the "bulging style" roof , to represent some Dorwinion houses .

Hope those hepls you