Terrain Project: Weathertop

With most of my prep for the upcoming GT already done, today's post is going to be a project that I hope to have done before this summer - Weathertop. Our dedicated readership will recall that at the last Hunter's Red October tournament, I took an army of Ringwraiths. Our dedicated readers will also recall that my first army for Good was the Fellowship of the Ring, and so Weathertop has a special place in my LOTR-nerd heart.

Hard-core fans of the movies will recognize that what I'm doing is not in strict adherence to what is shown in the Fellowship of the Ring. What I'm borrowing from in my inspiration for this effort is in part from the movies and in part from Lord of the Rings Online.

The entire piece sits on an 18" x 18" board of polystyrene. As you can see from this shot, the center of the base has been cut out (because I want the material for elsewhere on the project). The sides of this base are ~3/4" high, which not only means that infantry of all kinds will have to try to climb it, but horses need to jump it. This will stall some units from just charging up the side quickly.

The top has a few pillars still standing, and others that have fallen down. This gives a little protection for those standing up top, but let's face it - it's a ruined watch tower, not a citadel. Not a lot of protection provided and you can't stand up top and shower your foes with arrows forever. The ramps up this side, like those in the picture above, allow monsters and cavalry to move to the upper levels. In "The High Ground" scenarios, I intend for this upper level (touching it, maybe being on it only) to be the only scored section for the purposes of the scenario. This not only limits the amount of units who can score, but also encourages fighting all the way at the top (otherwise, a larger army could put most/all of their units on the base only).

Here's a preliminary application of gravel and glue, along with some of my spare polystyrene chunks to add some character to the scene. As a watchtower ruin, there are some traces of ancient walls (allowing some models to not have any protection and some mild protection to others), while the main entrances have only stalagmite-style rocks. We'll look at a few close-ups in a moment.

In this alcove, a few hobbits might choose to share a bite to eat, protected at least in part from the wind. I'm using "thematic paperweights" to keep this part of the terrain feature down, as the board is a bit warped. The gravel you see hasn't made its way completely up to the walkway - need to wait for some of this to dry to see where the boundary is from the first set.

We have some Ringwraiths walking around to make sure everything is clear, as well as inspecting some of the fallen pillars. You'll also see a Wild Warg Chieftain lying on his back, waiting for his glue to dry (confound breaking mid-game bases!). Ed note: while trying to move this to a place other than the dinner table, the Chieftain rolled over and came off his base again...new plan in the works...

Hopefully during the next two weeks, I'll have an update on the rest of the gravel, add some grass sections, and have some work done on the cobble stones at the top (not to mention a touch or two to make to the GT army I'm taking). Have a great week and happy hobbying!