LuckyJoeS on the Hirst Arts ezboard forum pointed out this past HADD competition entry as an example of a fieldstone tower with wooden hoardings on top.

It’s very nice, and similar to what I’d like to build out of balsa wood for the fortress towers. Although I’d like to avoid making it stick out so far over the ramparts and would probably forego a rooftop to make it easier for gaming. Something similar to the upper floors of my incomplete Mordheim Coach House would do. Have to build one for each tower though!

Assembling zombies…five more to finish and I’ll have 40 of the living dead to plague both WHFB and Mordheim (although 40 seems like overkill for a Mordheim scenario). Then I’ve just got to paint all the blighters…

Trimmed the corners off the wall sections so the whole fortress fits together much better. Still a bit of light sanding of the wall ends to make them abut the towers properly. Plus a lot of detail work left to do. Haven’t decided how to represent the main gate. Balsa wood? Or something a bit classier like some Hirst Arts resin wrought iron detailing?

I actually used about half of the 20kg bag of Ultracal 30, but did cast enough pieces for some additional terrain.

Well, since the family is away and it’s my ‘weekend’ (and the weather is crap) I went on a bit of a modelling frenzy. I’ve cast enough pieces to complete the major parts of the fortress. I’ve built all four walls bar stairways and detailing. I’ve also built all of the basic corner towers (without details). Each tower is contructed from a 4″ high base and a 3″ high ‘top’ and ramparts go on top.

The whole fortress goes together reasonably well. I need to sand the corners off the wall section’s MDF bases in order to be able to fit the whole lot together closely. Here’s a couple of snaps I took this morning after building the first two towers. The tower ramparts are just dry fitted at the moment as they need a bit of sanding down before glueing them on. The second snap shows the doorways that replace the arrow slits in two sides of each tower. Means the towers can’t really be used for a Mordheim city wall because the doors would be in space. I’d really like to make some equilateral triangle towers for Mordheim anyway. So then the city walls wouldn’t have to be placed in a straight line.

I’ve also cast enough spare wall builder pieces to make a ‘breached’ wall piece and the foundations of a Vampire’s Tower. Time to retire the wall and tower builder molds to the cardboard box that lives in the garage roof I suspect. They’ve both held up very well considering the abuse I’ve been giving them.

It also occurs to me that with a suitable bit of extra sci-fi scenery (say a dirty great orbital cannon emplacement or a landing pad of some form) the fortress could be used in 40k or City Fight.

How not to Siege a Chaos held Fortress in 7 turns:

It’s not obvious from these photos, but there’s 15 Ghouls jumping up and down the far flank trying to seize the ramparts from the Marauders and not having much luck. Despite support by giant undead blood drinking bats.

Right, three more casts of the wall builder mold and I have enough sections to build the final wall and four tower bases. I’ve also cast enough of the tower builder mold to build one tower and have started casting for a second tower. I believe in another week I should have finished basic construction of the WHFB fortress/Mordheim city wall.

Then it’s time to kick back and do some detail work like stairways to the ramparts (either plaster or balsa) and extra balsa fortification around the gatehouse and towers and then I’ll have to bust out the paint.

The city wall featured in it’s first Siege game last night as well. Enjoyed by all I believe!

It’s a terrible shame half of those Zombies aren’t even assembled…let alone painted. But you can almost imagine how good this photo would look if everything *was* painted :)

I’ve also noticed that my garage is becoming increasingly cluttered with finished terrain. Might have to consider purchasing a second storage cupboard just for the terrain. Mad.

Well, poured the Ultrasil for the Tower builder mold last night and it set overnight. Fresh Ultrasil only takes about 4-6 hours to completely set. Brushed the Ultrasil onto the master to reduce bubbles in the undercuts. Gives you a nice close and clean mold but I had to destroy the master to get the mold off it fit so well. I was also a lot more generous around the walls of the mold as I’ve noticed the wall builder mold occasionally deforms when casting. Poured the first tower builder cast before I left for work this morning and it’s setting now.

Also filed down some cast walls last night and dry fitted them for a tower base. They go together ok although I notice there’s some subtle ‘bowing’ in the casts. Probably because the wall builder mold is quite thin on the bottom.

I’ve noticed that Ultracal 30 has a considerably longer de-molding time than Hydrostone. Hydrostone casts could usually be de-molded in about 15-20 minutes. Ultracal casts are best left an hour before demolding. Ultracal is also a greyer stone once set - although I’m painting over all my bricks of course.