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The Last Alliance

Version 1.1 13/11/02

 

Gaming Board Set up

Introduction

This article shows how I set up my Bree gaming board. It is not by any means the only way to set up a Bree board. It is not an exact scale replica of the movie set, but does hopefully capture some key locations. I roughly based this on the Perry brothers Bree board that appeared in White Dwarf in the July edition and is now in the Two Towers rule book on page 142. Some more pictures can be seen below. I shall break the set up down in to the following categories: Buildings, Roads, Walls and Fences , and Plants. To see a list of the relevant scenery articles click here. On a quick note, this isn't really an article to read from start to finish, but rather a guide to refer to when making a board set in Bree.

Here is a map of the planned board set up:

The board itself is 6 foot by 4 foot. From the bottom of the board to the main wall with the Gatehouses is 2 foot. From the wall to the top of the board is 4 foot. This means with some slight adjustments to starting positions the Games Workshop scenarios set in Bree can still be played on the board.

Buildings

The buildings are all based on Adrian's Bree House guide with some variations. The following map shoes the house layout with numbers to refer to.

You may see from the pictures my buildings are not near the quality of Adrians and I admit I cut a few corners here and there and some are a bit rough around the edges.

House 1

The is the Gate House and a separate scenery guide will show how to make these.

House 2

This is almost exactly the same as the house in the Bree House Guide, except the back upper extension has been removed and replaced with a lower extension.

House 3

This has an upstairs and downstairs. The upper floor is just the Bree House Guide, the lower floor is just a rectangle shape the same width as the upper floor, but half an inch shorter in length. This will produce the front over hang seen below.

The beams sticking out from the over hang are made from matchsticks cut to size and glued on with PVA glue.

House 4

Again, the upper floor is made as the Bree House Guide shows and the lower floor is the same length, but half an inch shorter in width to produce a side over hang.

House 5

The upper floor is as the Bree House Guide describes, the lower floor is a rectangle that is an inch shorter in both length and width. This will produce an over hang that goes all around the building.

The matchstick support beams only come out from the front and back and not the sides.

House 6

This is made is a similar manner to the house above, except it is made more square. It has a front over hang. The upper floor is 5 inches by 6 1/2 inches and the lower floor is 5 inches by 6 inches. Instead of a wooden frame around the door, I have put stone blocks. These are made from squares od cereal box case that is roughly half an inch square. These are then painted in the same manner as the roof tiles. The upstairs has a double front window. This is the house the Strider and the Hobbits are in when the Ringwraiths are inside the Prancing Pony. Aragorn is looking out of this window in the movie.

House 7

This is made exactly as describe in the Bree House Guide.

House 8 - The archway

Next to the Prancing Pony and the Gate Houses this is the most complex building. It consists of two small buildings and two square wall blocks.

The easiest building to make is the one on the left in the picture below. This is 3 1/2 inches by 4 inches. The roof point is 3 inches high. Notice the pattern of the beams on the front of the building.

The longer building that forms the archway is 8 inches by 1 1/2 inches. The roof point is 2 inches high. There is a slight curve is a section of this building. Below is a line drawing showing this. This curve forms the archway. The flat pieces rest on top of the block wall parts. There is also an upper extension that is made in a similar manner to the Bree House Guide.

The wall blocks are just rectangles of card. The first is 3 inches by 6 inches and 3 inches high. Thishas a doorway cut in it. This doorway is made by cutting out the door shape with a curved top from the wall and putting the piece to one side. This gould be about an inche wide and 1 1/4 - 1 1/2 inches high. Along strip of card half an inch wide is the cut out. This is then glued around around the door way cut out, some scoring alone the long strip may be required so that it bends around 90 degrees. You should have a piece similar to the line drawing below.

This is then glued to the inside of the cut out doorway forming an alcove. This is about 2 1/2 inches in from the front of the block. The door way is then framed using stones that are made from cereal box card. The inner part is painted black and the stones are painted in various greys.

The second block wall is 2 1/2 inches by 3 inches and 3 inches high.

To detail the walls you have four options that range from the best looking but most expensive to the cheapest in price and looks.

Option 1 - Use plastic wall sections to cover the blocks, as used in the wall scenery guide.

Option 2 - Cover in wall patterned paper which you can buy or make yourselves, as used in the Balins Tomb guide.

Option 3 - Cover in cut out card bricks, as used in the ruined wall guide.

Option 4 - Paint a brick pattern on them.

House 9

See House 3

House 10 and House 11

See House 5

 

Roads

Here is a description of all the road sections needed for the Bree board. There is not photos of all the road pieces, so please refer to the following map for details on shape. The measurements are correct for me and may not work out exactly for yourselfs. When I first built the road sections I first made paper templates using these measurements. You should possible to the same to see if any adjustments to size are needed for your board.

Road 1

This is a junction piece and is 10 inches long and 3 inches wide. the junction piece starts 2 inches in from the end and is 2 1/2 inches wide. It should jut out about 1 - 1 1/2 inches.

Road 2

This is 11 1/2 inches by 3 inches.

Road 3

This is the same as Road 2.

Road 4

This is 7 3/4 inches by 3 inches.

Road 5

This is a crossroads piece that is 6 1/2 inches by 6 inches. Each of the 4 crossroads bits are 3 inches.

Road 6

This is 12 inches by 3 inches.

Road 7

This is 8 inches by 3 inches.

Road 8

This is a "L" joint and is 7 inches by 8 inches. The bottom road section is 3 inches wide and the top left road section is 2 1/2 inches.

Road 9

This is 11 1/2 inches by 2 1/2 inches.

Road 10

This is 7 inches by 2 1/2 inches.

Road 11

This is another junction piece similar to Road 1. This is 11 inches by 2 1/2 inches. The junction part is 2 1/2 inches by 1 1/2 inches and starts 1 1/2 inches in from the end extending downwards.

Road 12

This is 11 1/2 inches by 2 1/2 inches.

Road 13

This is a long piece at 3 inches by 15 inches.

Road 14

This is a connectiong piece that starts at 3 inches wide and ends up at 2 1/2 inches wide and is 7 1/2 inches long.

Road 15

This is 9 inches by 3 1/2 inches.

Road 16

This is a small "T" junction piece This is 4 inches by 3 1/2 inches at the horizontal of the "T" and 2 1/2 inches by 1/2 inches at the vertical.

Road 17

This is 11 1/2 by 3 1/2 inches.

Road 18

This is the Town Square, please refer to the map for a rough outline of the shape, this should be made to fit your board, the three road of shoots are all 3 1/2 inches wide.

Road 19

This is 6 1/2 by 3 1/2 inches.

Road 20

This is a connectiong piece that starts at 3 1/2 inches wide and ends up at 2 1/2 inches wide. This peice has a slight curve and should be made to fit your board.

Road 21

This is a curved piece that is 11 inches by 8 inches and the road width is 2 1/2 inches.

 

Walls and Fences

The main wall around Bree is made from two wall sections one that is 33 inches long and one that is 9 inches long. The six inches inbetween these two wall sections are for the gates of the gatehouses. There are also three fences sections (guide coming soon) at 6 inches long, two of which are placed together to form a 12 inch long fence. These are places either side alone the road section that runs from the gatehouse to the first of the Bree houses.

 

Plants

I shall not describe the exact locations of all plants, trees and shrubs but leave this up to the builder to place where they feel best. I will give suggestions as to where I placed some of my plant life.

Along the outside of the wall I placed a lot of bushes. I also placed some bushes along road sides and scattered a few in large areas of grass. A few single trees were placed here and there, most notibly on the curved section of road behind the archway (House 8).

Running alone both sides of Road 4, I ran some hedges that I purchased from my local model railway shop.

Other Peoples Boards

Here are a collection of pictures from other people.

PaulF

 

And now the inspiration behind my Bree Board, The Perry Twins set up. This shows how good a specific board set up can be. If you have the storage space then go for it. The pictures were taken by our very own roving reporter Adrian Champion

The above picture shows the ground floor of the Prancing Pony

The above picture shows the upper floor of the Prancing Pony

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