Villa Rides and Tigris Terrain Build

 Introduction

I’ve received a lot of questions about how I pack up my scenarios for travel, especially since I drive from Denver to Orlando at least once a year. Here’s a high-level look at how I handle it. For the bridge, I crafted it to be both durable and compact enough to fit in my travel setup. I also made a couple of caulk mats after seeing similar ideas on YouTube—these work great for quick setups and fold easily. As always, I relied on my good friend at Bill’s Gamer Garage and my cousin Bud at Bud’s Blast Markers to help with some of the larger terrain pieces.

Terrain

Let’s start with the Tigris River scenario. For the first battles, I used my usual Home Depot drop cloth, which has served me well for many games, but that changed for the Tigris scenario. I completed the new scenario early this year and played it twice—once here at the Colorado Military Historians (CMH) and then at the Colorado Springs Gamer Association (CSGA). The third battle at Hurricon 2024, was played using the new battle mat, made with the caulking method.

The second scenario, Villa Rides!, came together later as I prepared for the Fall games. It was played at CSGA and again at Hurricon in Orlando. The third Villa Rides! battle will be at CMH during our upcoming Vet Wars event in about a week.

In this post, I’ll walk you through the process, starting with the creation of the new battle mat and moving into the river pieces used in both scenarios. Bill really helped me out with some custom work—he made the flatter trenches and barbed wire featured in both scenarios. His palm tree bases for the Tigris setup are fantastic as well. If you’re interested, Bill sells these pieces along with some great-looking bamboo tree 8bases.

I hope you enjoy the pictures. I’m always happy to answer any questions!

Last Stand Dan

My battles are usually played on a 6 x 8 table. So I wanted a new blank slate to try and do the Caulking method for the battle mat. 

For the Villa scenario I cut out the elevations on both shores of the Nazas River. I used the Home Depot sets of 2 x 4 foam panels. You will see that these are strategically duct taped so the could be folded up for transport. 

On the Villista side of the river I need and elevated position to set the bridge end. More foam! Note in lieu of wood bases I use the the very hard pink to blue foam that I don't worry about any warping. 

This is Federal side of the river. Note the drawing on the foam so I can start building the town piece up. 

Stacking and gluing the foam so we can start cutting in the features. 

Carving with hot wire tools.

Once I started cutting it started to take shape of what I had in mind.

The buildings were made for me by Dr. Dwight Jones. He makes some great terrain!

Note the hard pink foam for a solid base. I will talk about the bridge build in a minute.

After I had the town hill cut out it was time to spackle it up.

Stealing this technique from my gamer friends, I started added the rock cliffs. 

Rocks were set all along the edges that gave it a great visual effect.

Started with the stucco all around the rocks and hill. 

This is where the bridge will connect. 

Both sides will have a sandbagged unit protecting the heights. 

So the final product was about 4 feet long and a couple feet wide. To transport I put it in a big trach bag to protect it. 

Using my foam board cutting tools I cut and glued down the town wall. 

Aerial look of the wall being put in place. 

Getting that texture all over the hill and used it on the wall.

After fitting the pieces together the river was cut using Runner Rubber material from Home Depot. 

A closeup of the rock and wall details. I think it came out pretty good. 

After getting many opinions of the river color here it is. It's a Behr paint called Ecological. 

1111

Coming together..

On each flank I built up some hills that had gun emplacements set on them.

Gun emplacement 1

Gun emplacement 2

1

A nice look of the trenches made by Bill Gamers Garage. These trenches are the ones we use for the Tigris scenario. I needed them as flat as possible since reading about how the Turk trenches were at times hard to spot. So there were used in both scenarios. 

So using a mixture of caulking, alcohol, paint and sand I spread it all over the drop cloth. Taping the edges will give you a very nice line along the edges. 

2

Close up of the texture. I did go over and did some dry brushing to make it "pop!"

Notice the water effect on the river. 

The Tigris setup.

I also made some river grass using the same runner material and artificial grass pieces. I used a camouflage non reflective green spray with some yellow ochre dry brushing. 

More views of the Tigris.

Another POV.

Tigris River - Ecological Green from Home Depot. Lay down the paint, then cover it with Clear Silicone, part of that process is dabbing it with a grocery plastic bag to give it the water effect. It dries sort of tacky, just brush on some glossy Modge Podge and let it dry overnight. Then it should be safe to roll up. 

Tigris Folded up.

This before I used the Caulked battle mat which I roll up. But you can see how portable it becomes. Add the terrain and buildings plus troops you can imagine it starts to fill up your car pretty quickly. lol. 
8

Nazas River for the Villas Scenario. Same paint.

Here is what the Clear silicone looks like when applied. At this point we dab it with plastic to get that water effect. 

River silicone drying up and clearing up.

You can see the texture coming out.