The first room is built!

So I've made some pieces, just to get the ball rolling and to see how the whole things going to look. I still don't have the cork tiles to mount it on yet, they should arrive soon.

I started with the bottom right room, which is here on the dungeon plan:

Here is the whole room

a close up of the doorway, I'm not too worried about the models fitting underneath them at this stage, as the floor tiles are so large they should be able to stand either side of the arch and still be on the square.

one of the long Walls

the small single wall

the t-pieces, I think there's another 4 on the rest of the board

the corner piece. Obviously 3 more to make

and this is what the doors look like on their own

More soon!

Casting done! Sort of ...

finally! All the pieces are cast for the floor tiles! I still need to make a few more for the wall pieces, but that can wait for a while, while I build the tiles and doors.

hopefully my cork board tiles will arrive in the next few days so I can start the construction process!

The casting blues...

Not much to update. I've cast a phenomenal ammount of pieces ready to build by dungeon. I think so far I've cast something like 200 floor tiles. By my reckoning, 7 more casts of the mold should be enough for the floor tiles and doorways!

On another note, I've just ordered one each of the Kobold blisters, still waiting for my heroes!

A change of plan, then...

So, the magnets didn't work out, proving to be too effective! So I've spent some time rethinking the design, and I've decided to borrow a few ideas from tile-based dungeons. Basically, I'll be making the dungeon in pieces. Each piece will either be a floor, a doorway, or a wall.

This has a few benefits. The first, is that the Walls are purely decorative. I can begin to play as soon as the floors and doorways are done, and make the wallpieces later. Also, the pieces are smaller and easily stored. Imagine a little bit like the warhammer quest tiles, but the doors are more substantial

the only downside is that when new dungeon plans are released, I'll need to make more tiles. In time though, I'll just have a bigger and more versatile set, so not the end of the world.

so I've cast enough pieces to make one of the floor sections. For the demo board, I'll need
Three 6x5 tiles, three 5x5 tiles, two 6x4 tiles, one 5x4 tile and 8 doorways. Here is a 6x5 tile (not glued or fixed to a board yet)

and if I set the board up the rooms will be separated by doorways (hopefully a bit nicer than this one)

I think I need to make another 40 casts for enough pieces, so I best get casting!

The first problem...

Today I started casting some test pieces for the board. My plan was, to hold the magnets in place in the mold with blu tac, then cover them in plaster so they set in place.

Unfortunately, in the past I've used 1mm or 2mm magnets. With 5mm magnets, they're so strong they'll fly together from a few inches away!

So I came up with a backup plan. I pressed the magnets into place while the plaster was almost set. Not the neatest option, but they stuck in place

As you can see, the top right piece is facing differently. This one is showing it's south pole, the rest are showing their north. This worked fine, up until I found the first big problem...

When I took the pieces out, I couldn't resist finding out how strong the hold would be. I didn't want to invest hours magnetizing the board if the stability it provided was minimal. It held alright, infact it held so well that the south pole magnet tore itself out of the plaster!

What I'm going to do is, wait 24 hours for the pieces to dry out fully. Hopefully by then they will be completely stuck in place. If not...I dunno...Velcro?! 

I'm using herculite II dental plaster

I got it from here:

www.maragon.co.uk

Neodymium magnets

More bits, just waiting on the plaster now. These are neodymium magnets,  and I use them for everything!

These are quite large, 5mmx5mmx2mm, but the plaster pieces are heavy and need extra strength. I plan to cast them into the floorpieces, so that the 4 sections can be held together and not shake about all over the place. We've all accidentally knocked a board, sending the pieces flying before! 

Www.e-magnetsuk.com

£8 for 50 magnets!

Tacky glue

While im waiting for the bits to arrIve, just a little word on materials, I always hate it In tutorials and guides where they assume you know and own every obscure piece of modelling equipment that exists.

For gluing the hirst art blocks together, standard pva isn't strong enough, and superglue doesn't seem to want to hold in place. 

I use Aleens tacky glue, it's a bit like PVA but a lot thicker and it sticks like rock when it dries.

These arrived today

It's only about £5 a tube, and they last ages. I expect those two tubes to do the entire demo board.

I got mine from here, cost me £11.50 for 2 bottles and next day p+p

Www.eggstravaganza.co.uk

Made some test pieces...

I found a bag full of miscast and spare hirst arts pieces from a previous profect, so I made some test pieces. Ideally I'll have better, more accurately cast pieces for the real thing, but these were good to see if I've got the dimensions right

first is a straight wall piece, 4 squares long. I'm using 1.5" squares for two reasons. First, I already have the mold, and second, I want to base my SDE models on 30mm round lip bases, which would be too large for 1" squares

Next, a doorway. The doorway itself is two squares wide, this should arch over that. As I built it, I was wondering if I could make a closed or gated door, for instance if a future SDE map featured closed doors. I think balsa wood would be my best bet. I could just switch the closed doorway out for an open one when the heroes get it open!

lastly, here are the two together. The pieces should all fit comfortably together to complete the dungeon....hopefully!

Building a dungeon...

So, i've ordered my supplies to start making the board, while I wait for the deliveries I've planned out how I'm going to make it. Below is a rough sketch of the board layout for the demo rules, however I won't always want to play this dungeon, so it'll need to be modular. Also, i want to be able to store and transport it easily, so it can't be too unweildy.

I've decided to make a 20x20 square flat board on four pieces. Ontop of this, a modular set of Walls and doors will divide the rooms up.

I'm going to be using hirst arts molds, which I've enjoyed using before. If you've never seen them, they make rubber molds to cast building blocks for great terrain. When you get the hang of it, you can cast high quality, durable pieces that look great when they're painted. Check their website out

Www.hirtsarts.com

I've ordered myself some dental plaster, some high strength glue and some neodymium magnets, more when they arrive! 

It begins!

Wow! How awesome does SDE look?

What do you mean, what's SDE?

Super Dungeon Explore is the coolest looking miniature wargame/board/strategy game to be released in a long time! With one drawback...it hasn't actually been released yet!

SDE is in production by Sodapop miniatures. It's a dungeon crawl game with a distinctive manga super-deformed look. So far, they've released a bunch of miniatures and some demo rules.The full game is die out summertime 2011. So that gives me time to paint a few models, build a cool little board, and check out the demo rules!

I've found the idea very appealing, having played several samey games for years. It reminds me of the glory days of warhammer quest and space hulk, but without the eventual lameness both suffered.

Have a look on www.sodapopminiatures.com to see for yourself.

So, without further ado, I've ordered two of the heroes from the website, and now have to sit patiently until my Paladin and Demonkin rogue arrive!