LOW COST WARGAMING BOARDS

Oh, how to set up a good wargaming table on a tight budget...

Lots of people who want to play Fear of the Dark or Frontline Heroes tell me the game requires different terrain, and that's actually true, since you need to represent different scenarios (an isolated house, a cabin in the woods, a forest, a small town...), but my answer is always that although this hobby is quite expensive, everything can be done more cheaply.

Often, when I say I play solo, most people think I must have spent a huge amount of money on miniatures and terrain. As a solo player you have to buy everything yourself and store it at home.

The miniatures wargaming hobby has always been seen as an expensive hobby only within reach of gaming clubs or people who can spend that amount of money by themselves.

We're used to seeing huge tables covered with massive armies of fully painted miniatures, with lots of resin scenery, forests of trees, rivers, mountains and many terrain pieces.

A bit terrifying, isn't it?

And even more terrifying when it comes to solo play, in that case all the expenses are made by one single person...

Well, in this article I'll try to explain that it's not so expensive to make a gaming table good enough to play...

Let's start with the figures, there are miniatures of all types and sizes: lead, resin, plastic, 28mm, 20mm, 15mm...

Prices will vary according to size, material, brand...

If your idea is to build a large army, then there's an unbeatable range in terms of price: the 20mm or 1/72 scale, which has a large number of different historical periods, ranks, units and whatever you're looking for, generally in plastic and always at more than affordable prices.

On the other hand, I advise you to play skirmish games, which generally deal with two bands of up to 10 models each, which will be a maximum of 20 models... a quite reasonable cost regardless of the models you choose.

When playing Fear of the Dark or Frontline Heroes you'll use between 5 and 14 miniatures per side, making it affordable in terms of figures.

As for gaming tables, we see all kinds: 3D modular wooden boards, custom-made, professional neoprene printed mats... but one of the simplest solutions is a green felt mat costing approximately €3 (and it's no joke) that can be bought at any fabric store...

If we talk about terrain, there's everything: we can find terrain made of resin, plastic, 3D printed (PLA or resin)... with different prices according to quality or piece size.

But returning to the idea of making this hobby cheaper, I have to advise you that you can find terrain pieces on the Internet ready to print on paper or cardstock and make them ourselves with very good results.

Nice gaming table, right? Well... All the buildings and even the roads are papercraft, and cost less than €10...

In this LINK you'll find tons of tips and tricks for starting papercraft from scratch, plus a heap of links to free or super-cheap buildings ans terrain.

We also have many terrain pieces at quite reduced prices from Asian distributors, whether physical stores or online (AliExpress).

Trees, cars, palm trees, trucks, bushes, streetlights, planes, shrubs... there's a vast world of terrain we can pick up for very little money.

in this LINK you'll find a handful of low-priced items for your gaming tables

The last and perhaps most important terrain pieces are handmade ones, made from any material we can imagine (cardboard, EVA foam, wood, coffee stirrers, cardboard...) and here the limit is our imagination and skill.

The internet is full of tutorials with different difficulty levels to make almost any possible terrain piece.

And with these guidelines we can set up a gaming table without spending much money, which is quite important if we intend to play solo without requesting a bank loan.

And to wrap things up and leave a clear example, we’re going to set up a wargaming board, explaining where every item comes from and how much it cost, so it’s obvious you can play on a table that looks the part without spending a fortune.

Let's see the cost of this 3x3 ft (90x90 cms) wargaming table:

the felt mat €2.5 (1x1 meter)

Cardboard printed houses €6

Trees €4

Road €2 (cork board)

Fences €8

Walls (ordered from 3D printer) €5

Various pieces (boxes, barrels...) €8

€35 for a quite nice 3x3 ft (90x90 cms) wargaming table...

As you can see, it's not difficult or expensive to get started in this hobby, or at least it's as expensive as we want it to be.

And from here I encourage you to start playing wargames, setting up your own low-cost gaming table, starting with the basics: gaming mat and trees, then you make some paths or roads, a river (even if it's a short section), with a river you have an excuse for a bridge, houses are really cheap and quick to make and look wonderful on a table...

And step by step, little by little, when you realize it, you'll have terrain to fill several tables with even different scenarios...

CARS, SCALES AND WARGAMES

I have been asked many times about the cars I use when I play Fear of the Dark or Frontline Heroes (ww2 or modern). The brands of the cars, scales and so on, so I have decided to make a post to answer a few questions.

This post was initially in the Fear of the Dark blog, but now I´m putting together everything in a single blog.

I´ll start saying that I use 1/43 diecast models, although sometimes they are labeled 1/64 or 1/50, I´ll explain the differences later in this same post.

Diecast cars are cheap, a huge range of models is available, they are tough and don´t break easily and they are already painted... what else?

But let me explain why I use diecast models instead of the usual models available from different wargaming companies.

AAR Frontline Heroes - SWAT vs street gangs

The Savagers are a dangerous gang that traffics drugs and controls part of the city center. Their distribution branches cover nightclubs and prostitution areas. They impose their control by force, even eliminating the competition if they don´t cooperate.

After an investigation, the police investigation division manages to locate a drug delivery between members of Savagers and another unknown gang.

A SWAT team is notified at the last moment to prevent the exchange and arrest the gang members. Unfortunately, given the speed at which they are summoned, the entire team is not present.

ALIEXPRESS FINDS

In this post we are going to put all those bargain pieces that we sometimes find on AliExpress for a really low price and that work perfectly for miniature wargames.

We will mainly focus on products useful as terrain in our gaming boards, and many of these products may have been seen in my Fear of the Dark or Frontline Heroes gaming boards (ww2 of modern).

FRONTLINE HEROES VIDEOS

 

Frontline Heroes Fields of Normandy and Frontline Heroes Modern Warfare share the same basic rules.

Those basic rules are explained in the following videos.

FREE MISSION FOR FRONTLINE HEROES MODERN WARFARE

I want to share a free mission for Frontline Heroes Modern Warfare (although it could be played using any other modern ruleset).

The scenario includes a predefined map, a list of the miniatures that make up each side, deployment zones, objectives and even a small list of events, with the aim of making this mission playable even with any modern skirmish ruleset (with just a few changes).

FRONTLINE HEROES MODERN WARFARE - A MODERN SOLO / PvP SKIRMISH WARGAME

 I´m happy to announce that FRONTLINE HEROES MODERN WARFARE is available in WargameVault in the following link:

FRONTLINE HEROES MODERN WARFARE IN WARGAMEVAULT

FRONTLINE HEROES is a miniature-agnostic asymmetric skirmish wargame set in the modern day. Players have the option to play solo, controlling one side and facing an AI system that manages the enemy, or to engage in competitive mode against a human opponent, with each player controlling one side of the conflict. Additionally, the game can be played cooperatively fighting together against the enemy controlled by the AI.